This was to be our last day in Québec.
We packed, checked out and generally got ready for the road. At about
11:00am, while
Maria and the kids checked out, I went out to bring the Jeep around. I
discovered it was snowing heavily. This might give some, such as BMW
3-series drivers, cause for pause, but it's precisely this kind of weather
that makes having a Jeep so nice.
The Jeep was covered in deep snow that took
several minutes to clear off. I brought the Jeep to the hotel and we
loaded up the roof box and rear with all our stuff. The little hill up
to the street from the parking lot was no problem, with the full-time
four-wheel drive doing it's job transparently. I had little doubt that
a place that saw as much snow as this town would have any trouble keeping
the streets clear on a day like today. We were not disappointed - we
had no trouble moving about.
We ate some of the things we had on hand
for a breakfast snack and with the Jeep loaded up, did some last minute
shopping in Old Quebec. We got souvenirs at shops, including gifts for
friends, and several plastic cameras that have small pictures inside of the
local sights. I bought them because they are
miniatures of
Pentax Spotmatics.
It was still snowing when we hit the road,
around 12:30pm.
We went back to the mall that we had found
closed the day before (Place Laurier), and got more Maple syrup. Maria got
hair clips and some shoes. In the interest of time and convenience, we ate lunch in Halt Buffette (the food
court). It blatantly violated our plans to eat only higher forms of
food but the sandwiches we got were very good, made of fresh materials and
not typical fast-food.
I found the glass in the seating areas
interesting and took a photo. It looked like ice frozen over moving
water that I used to see so often on small streams when I was a kid.
It was a sign that skating there was not a good idea...
There was a petting zoo in the
mall with some baby chicks in honor of the upcoming Easter holiday.
After that, at 2:24pm, we got on highway.
At 2:44pm I
stopped for gas near Laurier Station just off the highway. I managed to conduct the transaction completely in French
though I am pretty sure the woman knew I was barely getting by. It
occurs to me that I did not mention the price of gas. It was about
$1.10 Canadian for a liter. (It takes 3.8 liters to make a gallon, so
that's $4.18 per gallon. The exchange rate is about 10% so that drops
down to about $3.80 US. Ouch...
At 3:49pm I
tried to get some coffee near Drummondville, but the first two exits we stopped at, the coffee
places didn't have coffee... The carrafes were empty at one place and
the other place had what looked like hours old mud. I passed on
waiting for one place to make coffee (I didn't even ask) and the mud.
I resigned to keep moving and find another place. It paid off.
At 4:12pm we
stopped for gas at the Roger Vincent Service Station near Ste-Helene-de-Bagot
that had a
full-sized Tim Horton's with everything we needed. Some donuts really
hit the spot!
At 4:50pm, at Ste-Julie, 11 miles out of
Montreal, we got into traffic. It lasted all the way to the hotel. Welcome back to the big
city...
We got to the hotel at 6:02pm. I unloaded the Jeep
while Maria and the boys checked in. We were getting this luggage
humping down to a science. The roof box actually loads and unloads
very fast. No need to tie anything down - just arrange it in the box
and lock the cover closed. I left Jeep in same place as last time, next-door at the Holiday Inn in
the outer garage.
At 7:00pm we left on a walk for dinner, to
Amelio's.
They serve Italian-style food in a tiny
little crowded basement. But the environs belied the great service and
good food that waited for us. It was served fast and hot. We had a terrific dinner. It's a
great little place. The kids split their meal, we split our meal and
everyone was full in the end.
For desert, we went to
Press Cafe on corner
of rue Milton and Avenue du Parc. It was full of students studying,
many with laptops, no doubt slurping up the WIFI that is present. The
place was all about pastries and other deserts. The man working there was very nice to us
and we had some great coffee and sinful pastries.
We walked back to the hotel, arriving about
9:00pm. I loaded
up the GPS V's for the trip to Niagara. We all got to bed without any
delays!
